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| 1. Apartment 2. Car 3. Internet 4. Sanity |
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| THE APARTMENT |
| * Located in Kahiro-so (the name of the building pictured above), the apartment has two rooms (both floored with tatami mats) and a kitchen. The kitchen comes equipped with a stove, refrigerator, washing machine & dryer for laundry (the dryer is definitely a luxury!), electric rice cooker, and a toaster-oven. Also located in the kitchen is the shower/bath -- actually a plastic capsule! The toilet is Japanese-style, i.e., it's a squat toilet ... but I was just glad that it flushes, and isn't of the old-fashioned pit variety!! (Those truly are the pits, pardon the pun) Thank God for indoor plumbing and modern sewage systems! (You won't have to worry about the poop-sucking trucks, like some other ALTs do) |
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| * Apart from being a little old, the apartment is quite comfortable. It comes with a bed as well as a futon, and the necessary bedding. It has a TV with a small satellite dish that can catch two additional stations, BS-1 and BS-2, which broadcast many shows, movies, and sporting events bilingually ... although don't get too excited as most of the programming is in Japanese (naturally). The apartment also has a video player, although it's really old and it tends to eat video tapes. (My predecessor's predecessor found it in a gomi pile, and decided to give it a home - just to give you an idea of its wear and tear!) |
| * To combat the heat and humidity of summer, the apartment comes equipped with an air conditioner. I also bought an electric fan. To keep from freezing to death in the winter, the air conditioner also doubles as a heater (and it works very well!). (You might, however, want to consider buying a kerosene heater or a gas heater; they're probably more cost-efficient than the A/C, and good in case of a power outage in the dead of winter.) My predecessor also left a small electric heater as well as a kotatsu, which is a brilliant Japanese invention: Basically, a kotatsu is a low table with a heater attached to its underside. You remove the top surface of the table, drape a thick quilt over the kotatsu frame, and then put the top surface back on. Then, you sit with your legs under the quilt and keep warm without having to heat up the whole room! * In addition to all these features that came with the apartment, I bought a couple bookcases, a small "couch," cushions, and plastic drawers for the closets. |
| * I have some more to say about the apartment, but am running out of space on this page, so click on the icon below to go to page 2... |
| You'll leave Japan with stronger legs... |